Jasmine Murrell

Artist Biography:

Jasmine Murrell is a New York-based interdisciplinary artist born in Detroit, Michigan. She has a BFA from Parsons School of Design and an MFA from Hunter College. Her works have been exhibited nationally and internationally for the past decade, in venues such as the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit, the Bronx Museum, the African-American Museum of Art, Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art and The Whitney Museum. Her work has been published in Artforum, The New York Times, The Amsterdam News, Metro Times and Hyperallergic.

Statement:

Primarily, the works reference our unconscious associations around the body and question whom we identify as desirable and valuable. I then critique the limited perspectives and representations of an aging body while exploring an alternative to postmodern/classic nude figures. Finally, I am challenging the myth-making exploitation of young hypersexual fantasies in the digital age. Clearly, women do not exist merely to be consumed, yet even today, the representation of young, hyper-sexual, black, female bodies is so pervasive in art spaces, virtual spaces, and even in public spaces.

For most of my art practice, I have been more interested in the exploration and collaboration with elderly women and men in various communities. I’m inspired by a more expansive portraiture of bodies marked with time, experience, story, loss, power, beauty and substance all rolled into one. What is so remarkable, but also tragic, is the representations of our elders are so rarely explored.

I’m deeply invested in exploring and creating a new work that embodies these conflicting identities of vulnerability, power, and presence. For over 6 years, I have been working with a group of seniors at the William Hodson Senior Center in the Clermont neighborhood of the South Bronx. It has the distinction of being the first senior citizen Center in the entire country.